CUZ Cousins Properties Inc

Cousins Properties Incorporated (NYSE:CUZ) today announced that construction has begun on the first phase of The Avenue Webb Gin, a 390,000 square foot open-air specialty retail center located on 56 acres at the intersection of Highway 124 and Webb Gin House Road in Gwinnett County - a rapidly growing area of metropolitan Atlanta. The Avenue Webb Gin is scheduled to open beginning in August, 2006 and will become the seventh Avenue in the Cousins retail portfolio - with 40% of the first phase's 350,000 square feet of retail space already committed. At the time of today's announcement, several national retailers have signed leases to open stores in the new Avenue - including Gap, GapKids, GapBody, babyGap, Coldwater Creek, Barnes & Noble, Ann Taylor Loft and the restaurant Doc Cheys. Cousins Properties has developed three prior Avenues in the Atlanta, Georgia area (East Cobb, Peachtree City and West Cobb), one in suburban Los Angeles, California, and the recently opened Avenue Viera in Florida. The sixth center, Avenue Carriage Crossing, will open on October 19, 2005, in suburban Memphis, Tennessee. "The Avenue Webb Gin is going to be a great shopping venue for this dynamic trade area," said Joel Murphy, president of Cousins Properties' Retail Division. "The Avenue's distinctive collection of specialty retail and restaurants combined with our signature blend of landscaped common areas, attractive pedestrian walkways, fountains and bronze statues will create the overall enjoyable shopping and dining experience for which The Avenue is well known." The Avenue Webb Gin is being developed by Cousins Properties as a mixed-use project, with 245,000 square feet opening in August, 2006, 105,000 square feet opening in October, 2006, and another 23,000 square feet of retail space planned for Phase 2 at a later date. Approximately 65 shops and restaurants will fill the development at full build out. Introduced by Cousins Properties in 1998, The Avenue concept combines premier national retailers, select local merchants and specialty restaurants in an attractive, pedestrian-friendly, open-air setting and has been extremely well received by the consumer and the retailer alike. Cousins Properties Incorporated, headquartered in Atlanta, has extensive experience in the real estate industry including the development, acquisition, financing, management and leasing of properties. The property types that Cousins actively invests in include office, multi-family, retail, medical office, industrial and land development projects. The Company's portfolio consists of interests in 7.5 million square feet of office and medical office space, 646 for-sale multi-family residential units, 3.8 million square feet of retail space, 0.4 million square feet of industrial space, over 3,300 acres of strategically located land tracts for sale or future development, and significant land holdings for development of single-family residential communities. Cousins also provides leasing and management services to third-party investors; its client-services portfolio comprises 11.2 million square feet of office space. Cousins is a fully integrated equity real estate investment trust (REIT) that has been public since 1962 and trades on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol "CUZ." For more information on the Company, please visit Cousins' Web site at www.cousinsproperties.com.